Penn State still hasn’t revealed if James Franklin and his staff have awarded any former walk-ons with scholarships for 2014 and whether or not there has been any change in the one-year scholarship agreements that former walk-ons Carl Nassib, Devin Pryor, Deron Thompson and Tyrone Smith were placed on last season. I broke down a couple different scholarship scenarios a few weeks ago and since then scholarship offensive lineman Tanner Hartman confirmed that he is seeking a transfer. That frees up one additional scholarship for the upcoming season so that will be awarded to someone. Possibly one of the four players outlined above, or perhaps it will go to another walk-on who contributed last season.

As for 2015, the program will be able to sign at least 15 players by my count. Penn State is not able to back count any scholarships for early enrollees in the 2015 class since they used all of them in 2014. The only way this would happen is if a 2014 scholarship player left before a 2015 early enrollee arrived. Penn State can still early enroll players in 2015, it just means that the scholarship won’t back count like it did this past year. Franklin has already approached linebacker commit Jake Cooper about the possibility of enrolling in January.

I sifted through the roster and subtracted players who are on their final year of eligibility in 2014 since they won’t be part of the 2015 team. Of course I can’t predict who could choose to graduate and opt to leave the program early or who could transfer in the next 11 months. There could also be a walk-on or two placed on scholarship that could be renewed for more than one season.

Also, it’s difficult to project if there are any players who would forgo their senior year of eligibility and declare for the NFL Draft, just like Allen Robinson did this year. Two potential players to do that could be left tackle Donovan Smith and tight end Kyle Carter, but it’s way too early to predict that and I don’t see that happening right now. For my calculations I kept them with the team as part of the 2015 scholarship total.

Also, how quickly Stanko finishes up his undergraduate degree is another factor. He left the team in April of 2013 and would’ve been a redshirt freshman last season. The quicker he finishes, the sooner Penn State can wipe that scholarship off the books.

So, the very rough breakdown for the 2015 roster would look something like this. Keep in mind this is for 2015 so surely a lot will change in the next year, it’s pretty much a given that it does. Think back to just the last season where Neiko Robinson and Zayd Issah both signed their letter of intent but ultimately weren't part of the team.

Even the positions are rough estimations for some of these players at this point. I’ve included it only as a way to show how I came up with some of these numbers. If nothing else, it can give you a good idea about positions of need that they will look to address in recruiting.

If you include Stanko into the list below it puts the 2015 total at roughly 65 scholarships, meaning Penn State could sign 15 players.